Baby Reindeer is the runaway hit show of 2024, now nominated for 11 Primetime Emmy Awards including Outstanding Limited or Anthology Series. A sleeper hit that premiered on Netflix this past April, it was a word-of-mouth sensation that took the world by storm.
A big part of that success was the work of editor Peter Oliver, who edited four episodes of the series and was nominated for his work on Episode 4, the highest rated episode on IMDb. It recounts a harrowing traumatic incident involving the main character, Donny. It encapsulates why this show is so important to so many people around the world, who understood his experience.
[Note: This interview has been edited for clarity and length]
Were you aware that it was based on true events? Did it say that on the cover of the script or just through hearing about it?
That’s interesting. I don’t think I did first of all, but my agent told me it after I read it. I did know by the time I spoke to Richard Gadd.
What was unique about your collaboration with Richard?
He’s so gracious. He was so loving and really he had lots of words of affirmation in the edit and he was always respectful of my craft and positive about what I’d done with his story and what Weronica Tofilska had done with his story. Weronica did a directors pass with me, and then Richard came in and we spent longer than you usually do with the writer. If it’s about his life, it’s kind of fair enough he needed to go through it all.
It was very rare that he asked to see a performance or other takes. He honored what we’d gone through everything and we’d taken the best takes and then occasionally he did ask to see different takes. He usually said, “No, you’ve got the best take.” He was really trusting about what we’d done. I dunno how much experience he had actually had in the edit before, and so he was very respectful about us telling his life story, so he was lovely.
There is a vibe, a mood to the series that is unique. This intense balance between light and dark, comedy and drama, how delicate is it to handle it all in post?
I started in comedy a long time ago. I did a show called Skins, which was comic drama, and then I was in and out of comedy. I prefer the darker stuff because it’s easier to make people cry than to make people laugh. But what was so fascinating about this, it was so dark. But even in episode four, Richard still goes back to the comedy. There are still comic aspects. I
It’s less after episode four, but there’s a scene at the end of episode two where Martha has this jump scare in the canal. At first, it’s comic, and then it’s abusive at the end. He has this lovely way of writing it all in, because I think he says that even in the darker space, there’s still humor, obviously not in the abuse, but he writes the comedy throughout the series, and so you kind of are brought back to that comedy.
That is a definite thing that I was drawn to, the comic aspects. You could watch a scene and be laughing and then horrified by the end. He does that so well with Martha. Martha, you’re drawn into, but then you’re repelled by.
The tone really made the show more dynamic, you never know what to expect next…
Jessica Gunning, the actress, was so brilliant at it. I hadn’t met her until we went to a viewing and I just gave her a big hug and I said, “You’re incredible how you’re drawing us in, and then repelling us all, showing us how dark Martha is, but you still feel for her.” Richard didn’t show her as evil or bad, just that she was lost and she’s a lost person. This show is about different lost people and how lost we can all get. I think that encapsulates the show.
How’d you want the sound in the series to emphasize your cuts and points?
I send out assemblies every week. I try and make everything as final as I can or as much of a translation of the script as I can and the rushes. So, I’ve got a very big sound effects library and I’ll try and put as many sounds in as I can. There’s a scene in episode one where Martha invites Donnie to her birthday and then wants his phone number in the bar scene. It’s a Friday night and everybody’s enjoying themselves in the background. I put in a lot more laughter in the background and made it a tiny bit bigger than I would normally do.
I put a song on the jukebox that got through to the edit and it says, “Be careful with her. She’s in disguise.” It’s in the chorus and very subliminal, but I always like to even breaths just in the middle of that scene. I cut all the sound and try and make it as quiet as possible. You are just intensely focused when they’re looking down the lens and back and forth when she’s asked for his number, then I’d cut all the sound and it’s that intensity of the moment and just the breaths.
The use of music is prevalent but very sparing at the same time, as well. How’d the songs influence you?
I try and work through the whole episode without any music starting off with so that it’s very easy. I’ve done it in the past of wallpaper over everything with music, music, music, music. But it’s hard to watch everything without music and then find out where you need it. And so, if you do that, then you have to work into the sound effects to make it flow so that it’s not just covered with music. I think that’s a brilliant thing to do. It is just listen through the whole episode about music and then go, right, where do we need music?
I’ve heard many people work the opposite way. Everyone has their own work methods, but I could see how it could work with this story.
Once people have seen it with lots and lots of music on, then they just want lots and lots more and say to show them it with sporadic music, they might say, oh, what about the music? But at least they’ve seen it without so much music. And then you can go, okay, yeah, I’ll give you this little bit. I’ll give you this little bit until it fills out. But yeah, I’ve been guilty in the past of putting on too much music and then it just gets thicker and thicker.
Looking back, how’d you sum up your Baby Reindeer experience?
They invited me to come to L.A. to promote the show a couple of months ago before we knew about the Emmy Nominations. That was when it hit for me, because I’ve never been out to promote a show before. It was so lovely to come out with Weronica and some of the cast and Richard. We talked about it in front of 350 people, and that’s really when it hit me intensely.
I think it’s lovely to be sitting next to someone on a tube on the underground in London and see that they’re watching it and just… I don’t need to say anything, but it’s just like, that’s great. I’m just so thrilled. The biggest thing for me is that it’s helped so many people. So many people who have survived similar things to Richard. If it’s having that effect, then that’s the biggest thing for me, and that’s the biggest thing if it’s helping people to open up about dark things that have happened to them.
Baby Reindeer is available to stream on Netflix.
